How to Soothe Our Inner Wounded Child

Hi ACEs Connection Community,

I am a staff member here at ACEs Connection. I have been hosting mental health tools for personal wellness each evening for the past 2 weeks since we've had to start sheltering in place and isolating. 

Note: These videos are a personal project and not done on behalf of ACEs Connection. The ideas are not officially endorsed by ACEs Connection, although I reference ACEs science.

In this video, I talk about why childhood wounds may be triggered during this especially stressful time and demonstrate one method for noticing the wound and soothing our inner wounded child. When our inner wounded child is first attended to, we can find the strength to be more patient, more open to considering the suffering of others, and more effective with our anger to tackle the systems-level change that is needed to address the vast racial, socio-economic and other disparities that are especially revealing themselves right now as being everpresent in our society. 

Many of us are seeing our wounds reveal themselves in the form of increased anxiety and depression during this time of heightened stress and loss of control. "The research literature has identified three factors that universally lead to stress: uncertainty, the lack of information and the loss of control," says Gabor Maté in When the Body Says No: Understanding the Stress-Disease Connection. Well, that about sums up why we all feel so stressed right now! We have been receiving mixed messages in the media, there's no consensus on how long this will last or how devastating its effects will be, and there's no personal control we can exert to make it go away. We just have to wait and see without knowing. That's hard. Additionally, those of us who experienced childhood trauma and adverse childhood experiences may be especially hypervigilant during this time.

I hope this guided exercise and discussion are useful. You can find all my daily mental health tools and tips here. They are things I've learned from coaches, therapists, and books over the years, especially in my battle against Major Depressive Disorder. They are filtered through my trauma-informed lens. 

Best,

Alison